Berlin Opening FilmWomenHuman Rights/Labor/SocialHistory/War
Naru, a camerawoman separated from her husband and caring for their three-year-old son, and her friends in broadcasting search for ‘good men’ in Kabul, where war and oppression are part of everyday life. When a hardwon interview with a Taliban leader falls through, Qodrat, an experienced journalist at Kabul TV, leaves Naru on the street, ordering her to do vox pops instead. Her interviews with women, asking whether there are any good men in Afghanistan, attract attention, and she joins Qodrat’s news team. Afghan director Shahrbanoo Sadat deftly intertwines the romance of two journalists with the suffering and sorrow of women in Afghan society, drawing on the 2021 Kabul airport incident during the US military withdrawal from Afghanistan. As the opening film of the 2026 Berlinale, the film also offers the rare pleasure of seeing Sadat herself who, instead of remaining behind the camera, plays Naru, taking her camera into the field.
Shahrbanoo Sadat is an Afghan filmmaker who has been based in Hamburg, Germany, since the fall of Kabul in 2021. She has been developing a film series inspired by an unpublished autobiographical manuscript written by actor and writer Anwar Hashimi’s. The first installment, Wolf and Sheep (2016) received the CICAE Art Cinema Award at the Cannes Directors’ Fortnight, and the second installment, The Orphanage (2019), was also invited to the Cannes Directors’ Fortngiht. No Good Men is the third installment in the series, and it was the opening film for the 2026 Berlinale.
From Busan International Film Festival 2026, No. 31
